Dear Truman Families,
New beginnings are filled with hope and promise. That’s one of the joys of school jobs; we get to start off fresh right with the students! I still get a thrill out of the first day of school; eager faces excited to be dressed in their new school clothes and use their brand new school supplies. There are also the anxious faces hoping to quickly find their way around the school and make new friends. It is a source of joy to welcome everyone back and create a system to ensure students feel safe and want to be at school.
It is common at the beginning of a school year for students to feel more comfortable reporting problems to their parents than to school staff.
Please help us help your student feel safe at school by encouraging them to do the following in response to an unpleasant interac-tion: (Stop – Walk – Talk)
- Stop – Tell the other student to stop whatever they’re doing. Example; ‘I don’t like it when you…. Please stop it.’
- Walk – leave the situation
- Talk – If behavior continues, ask the nearest adult for help
Sometimes your child may tell you that they did tell an adult, but nothing happened to the other student. Please know that at Tru-man we avoid publicly reprimanding students in favor of pulling students away from on-lookers to have a problem-solving conversa-tion. It might look to your student as though nothing happened when indeed it did. Sometimes the problem-solving conversation is the end of the adult action; depending upon the response of the student, a consequence may be provided as well.
If your student reports something that concerns you, please do call school for details. Start first with your child’s teacher; as he/she most likely knows about the situation and will be able to work with you on a solution and be able to monitor the progress. If the student isn’t sure he/she was understood or helped, tell the classroom teacher or ask to speak to the principal.
Please know that we also teach a variety of social skills here at school. The goal is to help your children feel safe and confident at school.
Together let’s work to grow peace-loving problem-solvers at Truman!